Le rôle du comportement des usagers dans la perception du sens au travail par les éboueurs

In the past and present societal context, researchers have shown that, despite the indispensability of their work for society, garbage collectors generally experience the invisibility of/at work, suffer from a socially devalued image, inherent to the historical disregard of their profession linked to its arduousness and the disgust aroused by the garbage they handle. This research, in HRM, examines the potential effects of so-called "deviant" behaviors of users on the perception of meaning at work by garbage collectors. The preliminary results come from a qualitative approach, conducted through a plural data collection (ethnography: speeches and photographed work situations; semi-directed interviews) conducted since October 2023 with around thirty garbage collectors in the public sector of the Occitanie region (France). As envisaged in the prescribed work of garbage collectors, the behavior of users is manifested through 1/ their involvement in the waste collection and sorting process and 2/ the quality of the relationships/interactions they maintain with garbage collectors. In these cases, it constitutes a contextual resource, capable of reducing certain demands of garbage collectors' work and of bringing out individual resources, some of which are also characteristics of meaningful work (autonomy, feeling of usefulness, perception of recognition, quality of relationships). Conversely, in real work, garbage collectors demonstrate deviant behavior on the part of users, which increases the demands of their work while depleting their personal resources. These include deviant behaviors targeted at 1/ the service process (non-compliance with rules, non cooperation, eternal dissatisfaction), 2/ directed towards employees (verbal aggression, physical aggression, incivility). This research seeks to model the potential effects of deviant user behavior on the sustainability of garbage collectors' work (increase in physical and psychological demands and depletion of individual and collective resources) while paying particular attention to the resources corresponding to characteristics of meaningful work